New streaming on Shudder from Wonder Wheel Productions!
Directed/Written by John Adams, Zelda Adams, Toby Poser.
Check out the
trailer here!!
A cancer survivor named Mickey (Zelda Adams) suffers a relapse and seeks out a witch named Solveig (Toby Poser) for a cure when all other options run out. Mickey’s father Jake (Jon Adams) brings her to the witch’s home in the middle of the woods and is skeptical about her methods but wants to be there to support his daughter. Solveig says that the cure will occur in three days and in that time, Mickey and Jake will experience beautiful and horrifying things.
MOTHER OF FLIES is a return to form for the Adams family. While HELL HOLE was a little underwhelming and felt uneven in terms of terror, humor, and drama. And some might have thought WHERE THE DEVIL was a little too artsy and surreal for their tastes, even though I loved that wonky little circus slasher film. MOTHER OF FLIES goes back to the Wiccan roots highlighted in HELLBENDER and THE DEEPER YOU DIG. The story of a cancer survivor choosing her own way to heal and grow is a resonant one as it seems no one is a stranger to this devastating disease. I lost my own father to cancer and the tender and sensitive way this topic is handled was extremely touching, even during the more gnarly witchy parts. There’s a sort of desperation that comes to the coming of death where you want to have hope and be supportive, even when the end is inevitable, that highlights the human spirit and the Adams family captures that strong will extremely well here. It’s a story about a witch and spells, but MOTHER OF FLIES proves to be a multidimensional film that is both a celebration of life as well as an acceptance of death.
While some might say this film is the Adams Family retreating to the familiar, as some of the details of MOTHER OF FLIES may be very familiar to fans of their work. There’s an amazingly tactile and down to earth approach to the wiccan culture with all sorts of muddy rituals, herbs and roots, and the need of a sacrifice. These are common in a lot of folk horror/witchy movies but there is an authenticity to the way the wiccan and earth goddess culture that is at the forefront of the way the Adams Family deals with this subject matter. You can really tell they have done their research, but more importantly, they respect the culture as well.
There are no clearly good or bad people in this film. Toby Poser is no cackling witch, though she does let loose and do some horrible things in MOTHER OF FLIES. Poser gives her all in this performance, alternating between wicked and motherly within the same scene. Poser has always been the strongest acting presence of the family. But Jon and Zelda do a fine job as well. Jon plays the cynic, but isn’t an asshole about it. He respects his daughter’s wishes even if he doesn’t believe in them. It’s not until he believes that Zelda’s Mickey is endangering herself associating with this witch that he is forced to act. Zelda gives a soulful performance as Mickey. Having undergone many different varieties of treatment, she is realistic but hopeful this wild method might work. Being a family, the characters feel comfortable and lived in.
I also loved the set design and landscape that was chosen for MOTHER OF FLIES. The witch’s house in the woods is awesome, looking like it was ripped from a fairy tale. I guess it is a CG effect, but it looks like the painted backgrounds of old, giving it a WIZARD OF OZ style as it seems to have sprouted in the middle of the forest with tree limbs and branches growing all through it. The interiors of the house are equally impressive with the branches bursting through the floors and walls. The rest of the effects, while subtle, are more practical, muddy, and earthen like the witch’s powers that birthed them.
MOTHER OF FLIES is a horror movie, so some diabolical things are at play here. The story is quite a tragic one and really struck an emotional chord with me. It is refreshing to know there is a family in horror who can make such a DIY film and still have it look so professional and slick. The Adams family has given us another gift with MOTHER OF FLIES. It’s dank and dreary and muddy as hell, but it’s a hell of a soulful little fairy tale.
